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Minnesota State University, Mankato
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Page address: https://web.mnsu.edu/news/read/?paper=topstories&id=old-1126790837

New Orleans student gets early start at Minnesota State

2006-04-09
Distributed by The Associated Press, Minneapolis Bureau, 9/7/2005

MANKATO, Minn. (AP) - A student from New Orleans who had planned to begin graduate studies at Minnesota State, Mankato, in January is getting an early start since she has nowhere else to go.

Fay Yusuf, a Dillard University student, left New Orleans when Hurricane Katrina began to swirl, figuring she'd be back in town after the storm had passed.

But with no way to return to the devastated city, she asked Minnesota State to let her in this fall, though she had only recently been notified that the school had received her application.

Yusuf not only got in, but the school raised money for her to drive to Minnesota, and a faculty member found a place for her to live.

"Everywhere I go, my Louisiana plates are on my car and people everywhere are asking, 'Do you need anything?'" she said. "People at the grocery store are saying, 'Do you want anything out of our basket?'"

Yusuf had been recruited by Michael Fagin, the university's dean for Institutional Diversity. The chairman of the speech communications department asked officials to review Yusuf's application right away, and she was admitted.

The school then raised money from administrators, teachers and secretaries so that Yusuf, who had $45 in her pocket, could drive from Houston to Mankato. And Fagin, who owns several rental properties in town, gave her one of his vacant apartments and found furnishings for it.

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